Trumpeter Rick Braun Talks with Blaise Lantana About His New Album

Rick Braun Interview Transcript:

Rick Braun Interview Transcript
[0:00 - 0:52] [Music: "Doing Everything With You" — Breezy and soulful contemporary jazz with a singing trumpet melody and smooth rhythmic backdrop, moderate tempo]

Blaise Lantana: You’re listening to Rick Braun, that’s "Doing Everything With You," and that’s from Rick Braun’s brand-new release, Rick Braun Plays Chuck Mangione. And Rick is here with me today. Welcome to KJAZ, Rick.

Rick Braun: It’s a pleasure, Blaise. Thank you for taking a moment and thank you for playing my new project. I really appreciate it.

Blaise: You know, I find it intriguing that you were in—that you went to Eastman, and you were up there in New York. I think Chuck was—isn't he from up there?

Rick: He is a Rochester guy. He was born there and passed away there and, to the best of my knowledge, he lived there his entire life. And so, yes, he’s very much a Rochester guy. And I was there from 1973 till about 1976 and some change.

Blaise: So, is that where you first connected with his music? Is that where you first heard about him?

Rick: Yes. I mean, Chuck was making major inroads into pop music at that time. And I remember hearing "Land of Make Believe" and just really, more or less, just falling in love with the song. It just—it felt so good. Eastman was a very—the Eastman School of Music was a very high-pressure situation. And when I heard Chuck’s music and realized he was from there and, you know, it just—it was a very relaxing, therapeutic, uplifting message that came with his music and I—it was very welcome at that time.

Blaise: Now, you—I think of you, I don't know if this is absolutely true, but I think of you as a trumpeter. Is that really your main ax? Is that what you mainly play? Except for this album.

Rick: Well, this is a little bit of a trick question. Because trumpet and flugelhorn are pretty much the same instrument. They're—if you're a successful trumpet player, you play flugelhorn. And so many of my hits that I'm sure you have played over the course of my career were recorded on flugelhorn. There’s basically three sounds that I've used over the course of my career—well, four, but those would be open trumpet, a muted trumpet, as you’re familiar with Miles Davis's sound, and the flugelhorn, which is a warmer, warmer version of the trumpet. And the other thing that you have heard me play is trombone. I've played valve trombone on occasion. So, there you have it. That's me. All of those instruments.

Blaise: But this particular album, because you’re doing Chuck Mangione, you’re really focusing on the flugelhorn and some trombone, I see, and some keyboards. And I love that you’re working with some cats that you’ve been working with for quite a number of years. So you have your team that you like to work with and you brought them in on this project?

Rick: Well, I have—I guess you could say, Blaise, you could say my team and then some, because I was grateful—enough—grateful to have several guest artists, including Grant Geissman, who played with Chuck Mangione for many years and played that iconic guitar solo on "Feels So Good." And I was lucky enough to have the legendary Tom Scott play on the record as well. And Tom came over to the studio and, you know, we're all getting a little bit up there in years, but he came over and just played fantastically. So, it was a real honor to have him on the record. And Tom’s got about—he said he has like 2,000 record credits, you know, including Steely Dan and many more.

Blaise: I believe that!

Rick: So, Tom’s featured on the song that we just listened to, "Give It All You Got," which, incidentally, was—was the Olympic theme for 1980. Chuck—Chuck Mangione was commissioned by Roone Arledge to write that and it was the Olympic theme. The other artists who are on this record—guest artists, in addition to my team—is my good friend Richard Elliot, who played saxophone on "Feels So Good" and "Do I Dare to Fall in Love?" and Philippe Saisse, who co-produced both "Land of Make Believe" and "Give It All You Got" and played keyboards on that.

Blaise: Well, I want to do "Feels So Good." Let’s listen to "Feels So Good" where Richard Elliot is on board, and let's listen to that tune. Here’s Rick Braun. This is from his brand-new album, Rick Braun Plays Chuck Mangione.

[4:02 - 4:51] [Music: "Feels So Good" — Bright, energetic jazz-pop with an iconic whistlable melody, rhythmic guitar, and a steady, driving backbeat, up-tempo]

Blaise: That’s Rick Braun from his brand-new release, "Feels So Good," on Jazz PHX. I’m Blaise Lantana and I’m here talking with Rick Braun about his new album, Rick Braun Plays Chuck Mangione. Rick, you’ve been playing—we’ve been hearing your music for a long time, different—different styles, different things that you’ve done. How did you get started playing music at all?

Rick: My parents—my mother was very musically inclined. She was self-taught on the banjo and a little bit of guitar and played the piano a little bit, but mostly she had a beautiful singing voice. You know, she was a smoker and, of course, most people back in that era were smokers because, what the heck, Tony Curtis did it in every one of his movies, you know. But she had that beautiful, covered, smoky voice. And so, she was really the motivator to get me started in music. One of my older brothers played the trumpet and had given it up and when I was eight years old, I found his trumpet in my—in the closet at home at my mom's house. Being eight years old, I still lived at home. And I picked up the horn and put the mouthpiece in, just on my own, nobody was coaching me, and I just put it up to my face and, lo and behold, a sound came out.

Blaise: Wow.

Rick: Now, anybody who has ever tried to play a trumpet knows that it's not all that easy to make a sound out of a trumpet. It takes some coaching most of the time. But, you know, I found that horn and from that moment on, I really was passionately interested in playing that instrument. And since I was eight years old, and I'm 70 now, so it’s been a number of years of playing that horn.

Blaise: And how did you get to—when you say that trumpet players often play the flugelhorn and also you play the trombone, but it’s very different. I mean, the embouchure is different, the sound is different. How did you make that transition? Did you do that when you were in school, when you were at Eastman? Were they encouraging you to play more than the trumpet?

Rick: Well, there is no difference in the embouchure. It’s the same thing—the same, in fact, my mouthpiece is the same size, basically, for both instruments. So, if you play one, you—all you need to do is go to the store and buy one and, guess what? You’re a flugelhorn player. So, that was not difficult. Trombone is a different story. But, you know, I love the sound of the flugelhorn, and Chuck has always been one of my big inspirations, one of my heroes, and any opportunity I have to play flugelhorn more, I will take it. And it’s been such a joy to revisit all of this wonderful music and to put my personal stamp on it as best I could, you know.

Blaise: So how do you do that? How are you playing differently—or how are the arrangements different than what Chuck did? How have you taken it into the future, so to speak?

Rick: Well, let me talk first about what I wanted to do to be the same. Because Chuck, from everything I've heard from Grant Geissman and from people who've worked with Chuck—and from what I experienced hearing his music—he was very encouraging of people to be free and express themselves and not restricting what was happening on the record. So, that was one of the things that I wanted to do is allow the songs to be longer. This record has a lot more long fades, a lot more openings for solos and things like that than I would usually have on one of my projects. So, similarly to Chuck, I wanted to allow other people to have their say. And to make it different, I think one of the things was, you know, we kind of tried to bring—for instance, on "Feels So Good," let's just take that song, which you've played. That song, there’s a bridge section—a B section—that is famously disco. The bassline is doing a [scats rhythmic disco bassline] and it's very disco. So, we took that section and brought it kind of into a more funky, contemporary feel. And it's very subtle, but it's no longer disco. And then I added some horns—a horn section as well—which just put a slightly different twist on it. And of course trading with Richard Elliot definitely gives it a more contemporary sound. And I looked at all of the songs like that—how can I—I introduced some new chords in "Bella Via." There’s some additional chords in there that weren't in the original. You know, we could go through each song, but I just tried to harmonically and texturally update the songs and bring them—bring them more current.

Blaise: Well, let’s listen to "Bella Via." We heard it earlier this morning, but let's listen to it now. We’ll listen to "Bella Via" and this features—includes Grant Geissman on guitar. By the way, the record is just called Rick Braun Plays Chuck Mangione, and, of course, you can get downloaded or buy CDs, I don't know where you are in your life about that, but there are options. So here’s Rick Braun, we’re going to hear "Bella Via" and "Give It All You Got" on Jazz PHX, your modern jazz connection.

[8:41 - 9:36] [Music: "Bella Via" — Elegant and sophisticated contemporary jazz, featuring gentle acoustic guitar work and melodic brass harmonies, slow to moderate tempo]

Blaise: Kenny Garrett doing "Hargrove" with Rick Braun on the bass. And Rick Braun is here with me in the studio. So you're playing with Kenny Garrett—how did that happen?

Rick: It was a long story. I first met Kenny Garrett in 2002 at Blues Alley in Washington, D.C. He was playing and I came to the show with a good friend of mine, Ashlin Parker, trumpet player. And we showed up and we had a chance to talk to him after. And I told him I was a bass player and he said, "Oh, really? Are you good?" And I said, "Well, I’m working at it." And he said, "Okay, well come back to the club tomorrow at noon and then we could get together." So I met him at the club at noon—myself, Ashlin—and Kenny came walking in. He didn't have a saxophone. He had headphones on his head—no saxophone. I was like, "Oh wow, what are you listening to?" I asked him, and he told me he was listening to Japanese—the language. He was learning Japanese at the time. So we went in and we played some tunes. That was my first time meeting him. Fast forward a few years later, I moved to New York and I received a phone call. I was sitting at Raven's house and I get this call and it's Kenny Garrett on the phone. And he has a tour and he's asking me, "Is this Rick Braun?" I'm like, "Yes, this is he." "I have this tour coming up." I'm like, "Wow, I'm like, this is Kenny Garrett!" And he says, "Yeah, Rick, do you know all of my music?" I said, "Well, I know some of your music but I can work on learning." And I'd just gotten to New York, by the way. So I was like brand new, I was in school, I was still getting adjusted—you know, I was a little nervous. And he said, "Can you play for me? Play something for me?" So I played over the phone.

Blaise: Oh, really?

Rick: Played over the phone—which was interesting. And if you can imagine how terrible the bass can sound over the phone—it just sounds like [mimics muffled bass sounds]—it just sounds like... and he’s like, "All right, all right, that's good, that's good. I’m going to have my manager call you in a few minutes and then let me just have a little talk with him and then I’ll call you right back." Kenny called back five minutes later. "Rick, thank you, but we’re going to go with somebody that knows all of my music." And at that point, you know, I was like, "Man, I blew it!" Like, oh man, I could have done it if I would have just—

Blaise: Said you knew it?

Rick: Yeah, said I knew it or something like that. But I needed this time because I was working with at that time period, I had started—I was still working with Curtis Fuller a little bit, I had started subbing with the Heath Brothers—Jimmy Heath a little bit—as well as some people around New York—Javon Jackson, Wycliffe Gordon. So I was kind of making my way. And I loved Kenny Garrett. So, fast forward a few years later, 2011, Nat Reeves was leaving the band. Kenny called me just like the last time. "Hello, is this Rick Braun? Yes, this is Rick Braun." Oh hi, this is Kenny Garrett. I'm not sure—well, this time he knew how he got my number. It was from Benito—Benito Gonzalez, because Benito Gonzalez was in Kenny's band at that time. And they were looking for the bass player. Kenny asked me, "Yes, Rick, do you know all of my music?" I said, "Absolutely!" And I didn't know all of his music but after that, you know, we went—we had a rehearsal at his house and it was great and then we went on tour and I played with Kenny from 2011 consistently for 13 years. I’m going to Europe with him in a couple of weeks. I still do some things with him, just not full-time because I have so many other things happening.

Blaise: 'Cause you’re working here.

Rick: Yeah, but Kenny means—he’s a mentor to me, a friend, you know.

Blaise: So what—what would you say you learned from him? Being in that band—like any little thing that you learned specifically from working with him?

Rick: I've learned so much from him. I’ve really learned how to find myself within whatever I’m—whoever I’m playing with. You know, being able to be aware of what's happening around me, figuring out what I do know and what I could do to make things better. I learned really how to be the foundational piece of a band. Hold—because there’s a lot of energy and movement in Kenny's music, as you know. And so I learned that and I also learned how to get to always focus on allowing myself to get to that higher space spiritually within the music. If anybody's familiar with Kenny Garrett's music from the moment he started, you know, it is very spiritual. So I've really learned how—the importance of that—and that's connected me—Kenny was kind of like my bridge to my upbringing in African percussion because that's the world of the drum ensemble. So it's like you're feeding off and you're trying to get to this place, you know, and Kenny gets there every time. Doesn't matter where we're traveling, doesn't matter how tired we are, doesn't matter if soundcheck is at 3:00 AM where we live, but we're in China somewhere. You know what I mean? We have to play, we have to deliver the message to the people and make that connection, establish that connection. And so I've learned that from Kenny and that's what I do in my band.

Blaise: I’m talking with Rick Braun. All right, let—now tell me about this tune—this is "Ibu and Art."

Rick: Yes, so "Ibu and Art"—this tune is written for my father, who passed away in 2018, the same year that Art was born. Art is my son. So that's the other name play on the record: Freedom is my daughter, Art is my son. And, unfortunately, they never had the opportunity to meet in person. So this song is a tune that I wrote about them meeting through the music. So my father, on this particular tune, the arco bass—me playing with the bow—is him. And then the soprano saxophone being played by Stacy Dillard is my son, Art. So if you listen, you’ll hear this transition—that's Art really bringing his spirit in there.

Blaise: Does your son or daughter play music? Are they interested in music?

Rick: They—they love music. My son, he was doing a lot of African drumming when we were in Washington. We're still trying to find a group—some of these activities out here. But he loves music. My daughter—she loves music, she’s in dance right now. But she’s going to be starting piano very soon. She's four now, so it’s a good time to—

Blaise: Oh, she's little little!

Rick: Yeah, Art just turned eight. So he—but they—they both—they're artistic kids, they're very much into the arts.

Blaise: I’m talking with Rick Braun. And here is "Ibu and Art."

[13:36 - 14:26] [Music: "Ibu and Art" — Soulful and atmospheric contemporary jazz, featuring rich, resonant bowed bass tones and a clear, soaring soprano saxophone melody, slow tempo]

Blaise: That’s Rick Braun, "Theme for Ma" with "Mom’s Message." And this is—Rick Braun is here with me in the studio. Now what was this particular tune, "Theme for Ma?"

Rick: All right, so this song is—that bowed melody is something that I wrote that made me think of my mother. And moving—we’ve moved a lot—three cities in five years. And my mom is in Washington, D.C. And I decided as I was in the studio, I recorded it with just bass—just bass. It was originally just bass, then I added piano. And I said, you know, I always hear my mother's voice when whatever I'm doing, you know, like sometimes I need that guidance, I need that voice in my ear. And my mom, she sometimes she leaves voice messages that are really uplifting and that's just the type of person she is. She’s a healer, she’s—she loves people and just loves helping people raise their vibration. So a lot of times I find myself in that need due to the evolution and how my life is being in a different place. So I decided to open the record—do a twist on things—and open up my record using her voice over this theme just to bring people into my world. I mean, some people know who I am, a lot of people don't know who I am, but they can see the connection and the importance of my mother to me. So I wanted to open the record with that to start that journey because she brought me into the world and I talk to her about a lot of things that I experience and she’s just very wise. I just wanted that opening on the record.

Blaise: That’s a blessing to have that in your life. And to be able to hear it!

Rick: Yeah, to be able to hear it like 20 years from now, 30 years from now, God willing. As life moves on, we all go somewhere else, but to have that—to be able to go back and listen to her, go back and listen to the children. Just a lot of surprises on this album—it’s more like an autobiography with a—

Blaise: So now you’re also teaching at ASU, right? And at The Nash—are you teaching at The Nash as well?

Rick: I—I do the Nash summer camp, the summer jazz camps. So this—this will be my third year doing that. And I teach at ASU—this is my third year of—I’m a bass professor in the jazz studies department at ASU.

Blaise: So what do you find trying to teach people to play the bass?

Rick: What I find with the instrument is it’s a very personal instrument, it’s a very challenging instrument to play when you first get started.

Blaise: Because you have to find the notes.

Rick: You have to find the notes. It’s fretless. I remember when I was a ten-year-old and I took this instrument home, I thought I was just going to go upstairs and just play it and have a ball. I mean, it was very tough. I didn't enjoy it for—for maybe four or five years, you know, just depending. But what I do with my students—I have them connect because a lot of times, you can be exposed to so many things. You go on YouTube, you see these bass players, you go to Instagram or whatever and they’re like, "I want to do that," you know, some—some students. Not the ones at ASU are really good. I have a really great bass studio over there. And we—we work on—we work on patience and in understanding that this instrument, you really have to spend a lot of time with it. It’s such a personal instrument, you know, and it takes a lot of focus—you have to get your technique together—you can't expect to just do everything just like that, you know, just quickly—it take—takes years, you know. But it—but it’s a beautiful thing, you know, these my students—I’m getting a lot of inspiration from them because they are so—they're so hungry for knowledge. And I’m just excited for this release because they get to see—they get to see me play, do what I do, so they’re picking up things very fast. I set up jam sessions through Phoenix, through the Nash, at the Womack, and they—I set up these professional situations so they can come in and grow because the only way to learn how to play this instrument is to do it. Like, you have to do it all the time.

Blaise: Do you talk with them about playing with the—like what you were talking about, playing with different drummers, for example? Because the bass and drums really hook up.

Rick: All the time. They realize that they hear everything that I say, you know. I'll explain the difference of playing with Lewis Nash in comparison to, I don't know, Jeff "Tain" Watts or—or Billy Hart or the—the generations of drummers that I've played with. And they have these opportunities because that's why I set these jam sessions up. Because there's five different drummers there, you know, so you never know who you're going to play with. They make the adjustments, you know, they—they know what to listen for, like whether they're trying to line up their—their bass-playing beat with the—with the cymbal, you know, with the ride cymbal, you know, like what to listen for, the hi-hat, you know, dynamics, all of these things. And there's these things that we talk about in jazz education and you could talk about it, you could teach it, but you have to experience it. So I’m just thankful that they actually show up—to the jam sessions—they actually show up to the concerts, like when Christian McBride came out here with Brad Mehldau—I got tickets for them and I mean, it was just a highlight of their lives. They’re just so—they're so hungry and they're—they're such great students. It’s really—it’s really cool. It’s really cool to work with them.

Blaise: Do when they come back from a jam session like that that you take them to, then do they have like, "Hey, how come this happened?"

Rick: All the time. "What did you think? How was that?" and I—I encourage them, I let them know when as they're playing—I’m the type of person, even when they're playing, I'll go up to the stage and I'll put my ear to them like, "I can't hear you, I can't feel you. You need to be present, you need to be bigger. Don't be shy, play with confidence." In order to know if you're wrong, you have to play with confidence. And they—and they do all of these things. So they're able to display the things they're learning and they do—they always ask for feedback and I give it to them and I say, "Look, you get inspired from—from criticism and you get inspired from—from praise as well."

Blaise: And I think that's really important. I think musicians learn that—good musicians learn that better than any other thing. "I’m a musician, you can critique it, you can tell me how to make it better." Because that's what we learn and that's how we know we get better when we get those inputs.

Rick: That's right. I'm right—I mean I'm like right there with them. Yeah, I'm about to—like they've had these concerts this week and I—I coach combos and I play in one of the combos I coach. So I even get to play with them and—and help them and then it helps me because it—it takes me back to that point when I'm—when I was learning and I realize that at 43 years old, you know, I’m—I'm still a baby in this music too, you know. So it's like, I let them know that every day I wake up to be a better bass player just like they're waking up to be a better bass player too. But you're all going to get these opportunities, but I'm just preparing you guys, showing you how to be professional and be able to make the best of every opportunity. So if the Kenny Garretts call you on the phone while you're sitting in the house—

Blaise: Yeah.

Rick: —you know, how do you handle that? What do you do to learn the—learn the music for whatever band it is, whatever situation you're playing? So we do things like that. We learn other people's music, learn other people's original compositions, depending on what level they're in. Because I just want all of my students to be able to walk out of that school and be professionals. And they—and they're doing great.

Blaise: I’m talking with Rick Braun. Thanks for coming by.

Rick: Thank you for having me. It was great to be here. Great talking to you.

Blaise: Good to see you. One more tune I’m going to play you with Kenny Garrett, "When the Days Were Different." Here’s Rick Braun on the bass on Jazz PHX.

[18:31 - 19:20] [Music: "When the Days Were Different" — Gentle and optimistic contemporary jazz, featuring light, melodic piano, warm bass lines, and clear brass harmonies, moderate tempo]